6of39Pilsner Inn 225 Church St. Crowd: Neighborhoodies. Hot time: Any warm afternoon or night on the patio. Dress code: Whatever you wore to the Safeway across Market. Don’t miss: The old-school wooden phone booth, perfect for selfies.
Photo: Jessica Christian, The Chronicle

7of39Blackbird 2124 Market St. Crowd: Younger, homo-meets-hipster professionals. Hot time: The after-work crowd is politely cruisey. Tiki Sundays are also fun days. Dress code: More trend-conscious than skin-conscious. Don’t miss: One of the best cocktail destinations in the gay bar scene; enjoy something other than a pour-over drink in a plastic cup. Craige Walters’ interiors and the rotating art shows make for a great setting.Photo: Liz Hafalia, The Chronicle

8of39The Mix 4086 18th St. Crowd: Like its name, a mix — twinks to college boys to bears. Also a healthy gender and age mix. Hot time: During one of the many beer busts held for charity. Dress code: A sweater for the back patio bar is never a bad idea. Don’t miss: Free pool after 7 p.m. on Mondays.Photo: Tony Bravo

9of39Harvey’s 500 Castro St. Crowd: Old-timers who remember the bar as the Elephant Walk in Harvey Milk’s day, newbies curious about the bar’s place in gay history. Hot time: Dinner: It’s a great place to carbo-load before drinking and dancing. Brunch: It’s a great place to recover the next day. Dress code: Honor the bar’s namesake with a “Milk for Supervisor” T-shirt. Don’t miss: The “Mecca” scramble.Photo: Carlos Avila Gonzalez, The Chronicle

10of39Midnight Sun 4067 18th St. Crowd: All sorts with some great drag regulars. Hot time: The Mister Sister Mondays “RuPaul’s Drag Race” viewing parties. Dress code: Glitter works as well on Sisters of Perpetual Indulgence as it does on the Saturday go-go boys. Don’t miss: Castro Karaoke Wednesdays, hosted by Bebe Sweetbriar.Photo: Don J./Yelp

13of39Badlands 4121 18th St. Crowd: Twink alert! Hot time: Most nights attract a healthy crowd to the dance floor, where Katy, Gaga and Madonna rule the playlists.
Dress code: Your best club-going sneaks, and a shirt you don’t care about losing. Don’t miss: The black-lit hall of urinals with overhanging mirrors and the roomy dance floor.Photo: Tony Bravo

14of39Toad Hall 4146 18th St. Crowd: People looking for a change of pace from Badlands. Hot time: Weekends on the patio. Dress code: Whatever you can dance in. Don’t miss: The great sound system.Photo: Tony Bravo

15of39Beaux 2344 Market St. Crowd: Squeaky-clean and polished, like the venue. Hot time: After work, early evening, late night. Dress code: The tighter and more skin-baring the better. Don’t miss: The Beauxtox house cocktail, Cock Shot Tuesdays and the “nearly naked gogo boys.”Photo: Santiago Mejia, The Chronicle

16of39Flore (formerly Cafe Flore) 2298 Market St. Crowd: Casual diners and drinkers, former punks who remember the cafe’s mosh pit days. Hot time: Sunny days when the people watching is easy. Dress code: Casual bohemian duds. Don’t miss: The ambience of sipping a cocktail in the patio garden, the gay history from the early days of liberation.Photo: CHRIS HARDY, SFC

19of39Aunt Charlie’s Lounge 133 Turk St. Crowd: Bathhouse-disco-era queens. Hot time: Any evening performance, but Saturdays are always a fabulous show with plenty of classic older performers strutting their stuff. Reservations are available. Dress code: Sparkle, glitter and that hint of the ’70s. Don’t miss: Collette LeGrande, the sassy, saucy waitress and longtime performer who takes no nonsense.Photo: flickr, ilvadel

20of39Gangway 841 Larkin St. Crowd: Unpretentious neighborhood characters and kitsch lovers alike. Hot time: People always say they’re just starting the night at the Gangway … then end up finishing it there hours later. Dress code: Try a nautical yacht-rock-meets-punk-rock look. Don’t miss: The people watching and staring up at the black-tarped ceiling.Photo: Facebook

21of39El Rio 3158 Mission St. Crowd: A true mix of all the LGBT letters with a healthy helping of straights. Hot time: Most weekends, it’s wall-to-wall people by 11. Dress code: A mix of hipster uniforms then and now. Don’t miss: The live performances most nights of the week.

23of39Powerhouse 1347 Folsom St. Crowd: Leather, punk, jock, neighborhood guys — a real gay variety. Hot time: When isn’t it a hot time? Most nights you’ll break a sweat (which some patrons are into). Dress code: If you have some kind of apparel-related fetish, this is the place to bring it out of the kink closet.
Don’t miss: Tuesday night’s ink-and-metal dollar-off drinks for bar-goers with tattoos and/or piercings.Photo: David Paul Morris, Special To The Chronicle

25of39The Stud Bar 399 Ninth St. Crowd: Studs, twinks, goths, queens, trans, lesbians, one of the best melanges in SoMa, now the first worker-owned-collective nightclub in the U.S.! Hot time: Performance nights, of which there are many! Dress code: A great bar to let your freak flag fly, whether your look is haute or homemade. Don’t miss: The decor, the alt-music nights, the people-watching.Photo: Gabrielle Lurie / Special to The Chronicle 2016

26of39Asia SF 201 Ninth St. Crowd: The performers may be trans women and drag queens, but the crowd is usually straight bachelorettes and tourists. Nearly family-friendly fun for those new to drag performances. Hot time: Saturdays during the run-up to wedding season. Dress code: Given the excess of bachelorettes, a white veil and tiara. Don’t miss: The new season of the Asia SF set reality show “Transcendent” on Fuse.Photo: John Storey/Special to The Chronicle

28of39Oasis 298 11th St. Crowd: Drag and cabaret fans and alt-indie types tired of the squeaky-pop Castro. Hot time: Showtime! Oasis is home to many regular performance events hosted by and starring co-owners D’Arcy Drollinger and Heklina. Dress code: Dress as your favorite “Golden Girls” or “Sex and the City” star, depending on which sitcom is getting the drag treatment that night. Don’t miss: The decor in the exotic fez room, the roof deck.Photo: Mr. Pam, Oasis

30of39The EndUp 401 Harrison St. Crowd: Techno fans and insomniacs who are looking for after-hours fun (the EndUp is open until 4 a.m. most days). Hot time: After other bars have closed at 2 a.m. Dress code: At that hour, who cares? Don’t miss: A chance to re-create the infamous “tighty whities” scene from the gay classic “Tales of the City,” which was set in the bar.Photo: Liz Hafalia, The Chronicle

31of39Trax (Haight) 1437 Haight St. Crowd: Dive regulars and college kids from not-too-far USF. Hot time: Weeknights attract as good a crowd as weekends. Dress code: When on Haight Street, what the hippies do. Just kidding; jeans and a hoodie are fine. Don’t miss: Their highly recommended Bloody Marys.Photo: Katie Lips, Flicker

32of39The Wild Side West
(Bernal Hill) 424 Cortland Ave. Crowd: Neighborhood locals and people from out of the area cool enough to know about this hidden gem. Hot time: Sunset, for the views from the garden. Dress code: Neighborhood casual or neighborhood fabulous, a mix. Don’t miss: The whimsical garden with views and sculpture around every corner.Photo: Kurt Rogers /the Chronicle, SFC

34of39Barbary Coast 952 Mission St. Crowd: General Manager Nate Haas says of clients, “You get the counterculture of the ’60s meeting the hipster culture of today.”
Fee/Membership: No fee or membership required if you purchase $40 worth of product. Don’t miss: The fabulous decor, inspired by great San Francisco institutions past, meets 420 tech with the first-ever full quartz dab bar in San Francisco. Pride: Drag queens and snake-handling belly dancers are the featured entertainment at the party Friday night with flower specials all weekend: A quarter ounce for $35. Hours: 8 a.m.-9:45 p.m.Photo: Liz Hafalia, The Chronicle

38of39The Bloom Room 71 Jesse St. Crowd: Intimate. Fee/Membership: No fee or membership required. Don’t miss: The lab-tested potency listings on products. Pride: During Pride weekend, for every purchase of any purple label eighth, Bloom Room will donate $5 to the San Francisco LGBT Center and will also give a free dab for each donation. There’s also 20 percent off all concentrates as well as selected eighths on special for $25. Hours: 11 a.m.-8:45 p.m.; Sundays 11 a.m.-6:45 p.m.Photo: Santiago Mejia, The Chronicle

39of39The Gangway, San Francisco’s oldest continu
ously operating gay bar, is being sold to new owners.

The sun has quietly set on the Gangway, San Francisco’s oldest continuously operating gay bar.

Bookending an ownership saga that started two years ago, the transfer of the bar’s liquor license became final on Friday, according to the California Department of Alcoholic Beverage Control. On Sunday, the historic establishment hosted its final night of revelry.

Sam Young, the owner of the sometimes controversial bar Kozy Kar only a few blocks away, will take over the space at 841 Larkin St., according to the filing.

The cumbersome name for his new venture is Kung Fu Action Theater & Laundry, which Young last year said would be a place where people can do laundry and watch kung fu movies. It won’t be a bar, he said, despite the location’s liquor license. Young has also cast doubt on whether he’d keep the name Kung Fu Action Theater & Laundry.

The beginning of the Gangway’s end can be traced to January 2016, when a similar license transfer showed the bar was being sold to a group called Breaking Chad LLC, which planned to open a concept called Daddy Bones. Gangway owner Jung Lee at the time was selling the bar after a wage-related lawsuit and the death of one of his longtime managers. That deal never came to fruition.

There’s a lengthy bar history at 841 Larkin St. The address has been home to a drinking establishment of some kind since 1910, 51 years before the Gangway began publicly identifying as a gay bar.

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With its shuttering, the Gangway joins a long roster of now-closed gay bars in the city, a trend some attribute to changing San Francisco demographics, gentrification and, even more simply put, acceptance of LGBT people in the wider community.

While it was open, the Tenderloin haunt was treasured by the city’s older gay crowd. Filling seats at the bar were working-class patrons from diverse backgrounds.

Though details about the replacement venue are scant, given the project’s curious name and Kozy Kar’s infamous reputation — a sign seen in 2015 made a joke about date rape, and ’70s porn plays on a loop — it seems unlikely that the Gangway’s old-school vibe will remain intact.

Justin Phillips joined the San Francisco Chronicle in November 2016 as a food writer. He previously served as the City, Industry, and Gaming reporter for the American Press in Lake Charles, Louisiana. He extensively covered the growth and transformation of Southwest Louisiana’s multibillion dollar energy sector. Justin also served as a columnist for the American Press where he won a Louisiana-Mississippi Associated Press Media Editors award for his weekly food column. In the past, Justin spent time working in the newsrooms of the Contra Costa Times, the Tri Valley Herald, and the Oakland Tribune. He studied journalism at Louisiana Tech University.